Over this weekend, I had you all fill out a questionnaire. Now, every question that's on there was on there for a reason, but some of those reasons are a bit more straightforward than others.
This one, for example, was something I had already been using a survey for, and I figured using my followers would meet a higher standard of science than using my coworkers and a few discord chats. If anything, it is needlessly biased in favor of the airline in question, since my followers include many Airplane People. And boy do the results speak volumes.
I removed the wordmark from this picture of an airplane and asked you all what airline she flies for. (Let's pretend the title of this post doesn't spoil the answer.) The answers were overwhelmingly consistent.
32 out of 77 responses, a stunning 45%, identified this plane as flying for United Airlines.
I mean, not hard to understand why. The only things that are different are a slightly darker shade of blue, minor tweaks to the logo on the tail, and the easy-to-miss detail that the mystery plane is registered in Panama. (In fact, the only way to recognize what airline it flies for, in my own opinion, is that the airline's ICAO code is in the registration. Again, not something the average person would spot, or indeed should be expected to.)
The second most common response was either not responding, or saying that you don't know. (Actually, a lot of people expressed unsureness, but these people outright refused to guess.) The third most common response was AT&T. The phone company. In a similar vein, another respondent guessed Euronews, the news show.
Then we have four people who guessed Continental.
This is completely reasonable, since their livery is just the old United livery - rather, United's old livery is stolen from Continental during their merger. I get the sense that the difference between people who immediately assume United and people who immediately assume Continental is whether they were over or under a certain age in 2012.
A handful of other specific airlines were guessed. I'm not going to touch on all of them, including the ones I've already reviewed - I'll just leave a little collage of the miscellaneous guesses.
Okay. So the answer is obviously that this is, as it says in the title, Copa Airlines.
Three people actually guessed this correctly, and two of them live in Latin America. Copa (Compañía Panameña de Aviación) is the flag carrier of Panama and one of the largest carriers in Latin America. I find Copa's livery to be almost powerful in how tragic it is. It wasn't always like this.
Back in the day Copa had its own livery, its own branding. And I'm not going to linger on the fact that these are Iberia colors, because a lot of airlines use similar colors but this says COPA on it in huge text in two places.
This might seem like a weird case of self-sabotaging plagiarism, but it actually came about in a way I find far worse. Copa and Continental had a marketing alliance, with Continental having a 49% stake in the company until 1999, when it was increased to 51%. Immediately, Copa, in addition to partnering with Continental, began to use the same frequent flier program and - what I care about - the same livery.
I don't even have it in me to care about how the livery is boring and the font is ugly, how it's a far worse version of it than what Continental and then United wore. That is like seeing a corpse and being disturbed that it has a bad haircut. This airline is wearing a livery almost universally recognized to be that of a different airline. What is even the point of painting your planes with your name if you care this little about having an identity? You might as well be operating as United Express.
The worst thing is that United has changed their livery now. They don't have a majority stake in Copa, and haven't for well over a decade. Copa has its own fleet, its own routes, its own holding company, its own frequent flyer program, its own history, its own name. So why is it still wearing a livery that was never its own to begin with?
Maybe they don't want to commit fully to the retro look. But there is so much room in the world for this vibrant color scheme, this large legible wordmark, and this adorable little airplane underline logo. If only they hadn't committed to having planes that, if identifiable, are identifiable as a completely different airline.
And that makes me angry. That defeats the entire point. It makes me feel a potent mix of disgust and pity. This is an empty, broken thing. Not even a husk. A little shriveled creature inside of a very large, empty, cold jar. Any life would be better than this, if it could just be alive again.
F.
I have opinions on its overall appearance, sure. And I am not factoring them into this final rating. You copy Continental's homework and change it a bit, you get failed for plagiarism.
Just...you're allowed to do more than breathing. You've had Continental's livery for decades. At any moment, you could say 'no more', and you could decide that you care about being Copa Airlines. I really hope you do that soon.
